Rezumat
CZU 537.528.2
DOI https://doi.org/10.52577/eom.2026.62.3.39
This paper presents the results of experimental investigations of a high-voltage electrical discharge (HVD) in water during the high-voltage breakdown of an interelectrode gap, which is the most common operating mode in discharge-pulse technologies. The main focus was placed on the analysis of the pre-breakdown stage of the discharge, during which the conditions for a breakdown initiation and plasma channel formation were established, as well as on evaluating the efficiency of the discharge process. Oscilloscopes with different time scales were used to record the processes, allowing a detailed measurement of the temporal behavior of the current, voltage, electrical resistance, power, and energy dissipated in the medium and released across the load. An analysis of the oscillograms showed that during the pre-breakdown stage, the current decays more slowly than the voltage, while the dissipated energy gradually increases. At the moment of a breakdown, a sharp decrease in voltage and a rapid increase in current were observed, accompanied by a reduction in the resistance of the discharge gap to a value characteristic of a plasma channel. The obtained time dependences of the electrical resistance, power, and energy make it possible to evaluate the dynamics of energy conversion during a discharge formation.
Keywords: high-voltage discharge, pre-breakdown stage, plasma channel, discharge-pulse technologies, discharge energy.